Syria dismissed televised statements by men who said they had been trained by the Syrian intelligence service to become insurgents in Iraq. The official Syrian Arab News Agency on Thursday quoted a security source as saying the remarks were "utterly baseless and unfounded." Iraq's state-run and U.S.-funded Al Iraqiya television channel Wednesday aired what appeared to be televised confessions by insurgents. In one statement, a man said, "My name is Anas Ahmed al-Essa. I live in Halab.

The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department has paid hefty settlements in recent years in civil cases in which deputies were not disciplined, suggesting that internal affairs investigators "let an officer off the hook when a judge or jury would not," according to a new report.

Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer sued Monday to block the California prison guards union from obtaining internal affairs documents, saying the state's ability to investigate wrongdoing by employees behind prison walls could be undermined. Lockyer filed the suit after an arbitrator sided with the union in a dispute over a provision in the prison officers' labor contract with the state.

With a $414,000 federal grant from the Department of Justice, 13 big-city police departments from across the country will gather in Los Angeles to develop better standards for handling internal affairs investigations, top Los Angeles police officials are expected to announce today.

State prison officials failed to adequately analyze the cost of shutting a Southern California internal affairs office that has handled some of the most explosive prison misconduct cases in recent years, members of a Senate committee charged Thursday. The lawmakers stopped short of accusing prison authorities of proposing to shut the Rancho Cucamonga office for political reasons.

A divided Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday approved the addition of more than 50 employees to boost the Police Department's compliance with a federal consent decree regarding past civil rights violations. Although several council members objected that the move will take police officers off the street, LAPD officials said they have a critical need to fill dozens of positions approved during last year's budget process but still empty because of a citywide hiring freeze.

Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton has tapped Irvine Police Chief Michael Berkow, who has made a reputation for reforming police agencies and targeting municipal corruption, as his new deputy chief, with initial responsibility for internal affairs. Berkow, 47, will become the first high-ranking sworn officer other than the chief to come from outside the ranks of the LAPD. "LAPD is a truly rare department, with not only a national but international reputation.

Two Los Angeles police officers sought to cover up their contact with a 16-year-old gang member who was shot to death on the border of a rival gang's territory just minutes after the officers released him from their patrol car, according to a district attorney's review of the case. Neither officer, one of whom was accused of dropping off the same youth in rival gang territory as punishment a month earlier, documented the encounter with the victim on the day he was killed.

April 9, 2002 | ERWIN CHEMERINSKY, Erwin Chemerinsky, a constitutional law professor at
USC, conducted an independent review of the LAPD Board of Inquiry's report on the Rampart scandal for the Police Protective League.

The divisive debate over whether Chief Bernard Parks should be reappointed has focused too much on personality and race and not nearly enough on what remains to be done to reform the Los Angeles Police Department. No matter who is the chief, many further reforms of the LAPD are essential. As the Police Commission deliberates Parks' fate, a key question must be whether he is the right person to bring about these changes. Although the consent decree between the U.S.

Belarus expelled a U.S. citizen for allegedly conspiring with the opposition to oust President Alexander G. Lukashenko in voting next month. Robert Fielding was accused by Belarus' security service of interfering in the country's internal affairs by campaigning for candidate Vladimir Goncharik, a trade union leader. Fielding, an AFL-CIO official, is also accused of supporting a plot by the opposition to overthrow Lukashenko through mass protests if he wins the Sept. 9 election.